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Friday, May 10, 2013

Never get the chance again

As it can happen in some families, something happens that causes a divide and sides get chosen. Though I wasn’t in the middle of it by any means, I felt I needed to choose. Neither pressed me to do it, but I quietly chose mine and left it at that.

2 years after making that decision, I’m sad. Both sides mean a whole lot to me and I struggled with wanting to reach out to the other side often, but I never did. I’m embarrassed that I thought constantly over those 2 years to write a letter, to reconnect, to see how they were doing but never actually grabbing the pen and paper and taking that much needed important time out of my non busy life to write. Making excuses and always saying I’ll do it later, I have time to do it later.

My phone rang at 6:30 in the morning and anytime my phone rings that early, its never a good sign. My uncle, the one when growing up would always answer to my ‘hello?’ on the phone, “what are you doing!?” to which I’d reply, ‘talking to you!’, died Monday night.

It was unexpected. to me.

Its been 2 years, I had no idea how his health had been and I never wrote that letter to reconnect with him and my Aunt, whether they would have responded or not (though I believe they would have), I never gave that 10 minutes of my day to write. I had an opportunity over a year ago to email, and yet I stayed silent. It was a very conflicting decision then, one that I battled with for a long time but in the end justified it because I was ‘going to write that letter’.

I still have a chance with my Aunt. but the guilt. the guilt over not talking to my Uncle is there. and it’ll be there for awhile.

8 comments:

i have no wise words (though given a few days i may come up with some) for you right now. but i am sure, like the commenter above, that in his heart he knew. so sorry for this loss. maybe this will aid in the conflict being put to rest.

I too am so sorry. Its extra painful when there is a rift but maybe something really good could come of this. Its not easy to allow ourselves to ignore our painful feelings of guilt but if it is going to only create more of them then...sometimes its best to accept guilt for what it is--a feeling, nothing more.Best of everything to you and all of your family.

I read this from my phone the other day and wasn't able to comment, but wanted to come back and say that I'm so sorry for your loss.

Getting caught in the middle is never a good position to be in, because the fact that there are any "sides" at all only means that someone is bound to be hurt. Please don't beat yourself up about it; that guilt will eventually destroy you if you let it. Like you said, you still have a chance with your aunt...listen to your heart. If it leads you to her, go. I'm sure that hearing from you would be a comfort to her...and maybe to you, too.